


Through the Valley of the Shadow

by beerecordings



Category: jacksepticeye egos - Fandom
Genre: Anti being a creep, Anti wearing Jack's skin, Blood, Chase and Jamie are good brothers, Chase and Jamie protecting each other, Don't copy to another site, Frank Sinatra - Freeform, Grief, How It Feels To Drive Through American Countryside, Implied Character Death, Mentions of Character Death, Mild Gore, Mild Horror, Rhinos as metaphors, Running Away, car crash, the only ones left in fact
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-11
Updated: 2019-08-11
Packaged: 2020-08-18 23:00:46
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,057
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20199598
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/beerecordings/pseuds/beerecordings
Summary: Chase and Jameson only have each other left. Each other and the monster that haunts them.“There used to be many Northern white rhinos, living happily throughout Northern Africa in large numbers. But the reason for their decline, and now, near extinction, is all too clear – poaching has led these innocent creatures to their end. Even now, the two remaining Northern white rhinos must be protected around the clock, wary of hunters at all time."“Can we listen to something else?” asks Chase.“Today, we grieve the loss of this magnificent species, once a proud and numerous symbol of their homeland. With only two remaining, how can they expect to survive?"JJ turns the radio off.





	Through the Valley of the Shadow

He moves through the shadows of the mountains at his brother’s side, curled up against the window of the shitty 2002 Dodge Neon they stole from a rancher’s backyard at three in the morning, trying not to nightmare.

He dozes instead of sleeping, suspended in awakeness by the rapid thud-thud-thud of the vibrating window against his skull.

“Turn the radio on?” he asks drowsily, readjusting and putting his jacket against his head.

JJ pushes the power button on the radio and flicks through the channels, bypassing Mexican music complete with a joyful grito, hypermasculine country trash, the top 40s station, and an orchestral piece featuring an celloist going absolutely ham on Shostakovich’s Symphony Number One before landing on a talk show about the declining white rhino population in Southern Africa.

Not what Chase would have picked, but he’ll forgive his little brother’s eccentrism for the relief of a voice to listen to.

“Two female Northern white rhinos live at the Pejeta Conservatory in Kenya, and today, they and the rest of the world are grieving a terrible loss – the death of the last male Northern white rhino, Sudan, who passed away last Monday at the ripe old age of forty-five.”

“That’s sad,” Chase mumbles, rubbing his face. Fuck, he’s hungry. Maybe he’ll wake up after all. Sitting up in his chair, he heaves out a deep sigh and glances over at JJ, who doesn’t even bother to nod, his exhausted eyes fixed on the road.

“You should let me drive next.”

Jameson shakes his head, shifting uncomfortably. His fingers are gripped very tight on the steering wheel.

“The loss of the Northern white rhino species has been sudden and devastating. In 2015, five rhinos lived in captivity, and there were hopes of babies being born to help save the species. But now, only two of the rhinos remain, and it seems their death warrant has been signed by the loss of Sudan.”

Chase glances out the window, where proud tall trees rise towards a fervently blue sky, heavy with spring greenery. Their car curves down a winding road through a rocky mountainside, spitting gravel off the side of the cliff as they speed along towards their destination.

What destination? Chase wonders, watching the light of the sun play along the surface of a quiet blue lake miles below them. Where can we go that he will not find us?

“Hey, any beef jerky left?”

Jamie shakes his head again, glancing over at his brother. A flicker of his old warmth wakes up in his eyes as he meets Chase’s gaze, his twin in tiredness.

He takes his hands off the wheel long enough to sign, “Stop soon.”

“Okay.”

Chase reaches into the back and grabs Jackie’s blood-stained backpack off the floor, taking out his journal one more time. He doesn’t expect to find anything that will help them anymore.

He just misses his brother’s handwriting.

“I think I’m getting paranoid,” reads the soft, scrawling script their brother left behind. “I can tell that he’s coming. I can always tell. The glitches, Jack’s condition. Sometimes I think Marvin can sense it too, because I hear him awake late at night, coughing on too much magic, full up on restless energy. I know I’m being overbearing, telling them all to stay close, trying to stop Schneep from going to work. I can’t get him to stay home. I’m just scared Anti will take him away first. He works regular hours now and it’s not safe. Anti could find him. Anti could find Jack. I don’t want to be an ass. I just want to keep them safe.”

Chase swallows back tears – he’s getting used to that burn at the back of his throat – and flips dully through the rest of the journal. Here are Jackie’s notes on Anti’s powers, signs of his oncoming appearances, what he’s done in videos, what he seems to want. None of it was enough to save them.

If only he had been a little more overbearing.

“There used to be many Northern white rhinos, living happily throughout Northern Africa in large numbers. But the reason for their decline, and now, near extinction, is all too clear – poaching has led these innocent creatures to their end. Even now, the two remaining Northern white rhinos must be protected around the clock, wary of hunters at all time.”

“Can we listen to something else?” asks Chase.

“Today, we grieve the loss of this magnificent species, once a proud and numerous symbol of their homeland. With only two remaining, how can they expect to survive?”

JJ turns the radio off.

  


Chase peers up at the dawn sky from beneath the windshield, his eyes flickering between the dead highway before them and the breathing morning stars above him, glittering in the faraway satin of a bright pink sunrise.

“Some parts of America are really so pretty,” he says, wistful. Brown and black horses move past their car, watching from the hills and nudging their colts around with their noses. “I wish we were just on a roadtrip instead of on the run, you know? We could go somewhere nice. Camp out or something. No, never mind. Camping sounds miserable. We’ll get a hotel and wander all the cities we like. Schneep always talked about traveling.”

He takes a sip from the caffeinated gas station soda in the cup holder beside him and then glances over to grin sadly at his brother, but JJ isn’t looking. He sits with his head in his hand, frowning out the window, pale in the wan yellow light of the morning.

“Hey, you okay?”

No answer, but it’s hard to have a conversation when Chase is supposed to be watching the road. And Jamie hasn’t talked much lately anyway. Hardly at all, really. He just clings to Chase’s side and glares at passersby in silence, his hand shoved into his pocket at all times. Chase is pretty sure he’s always holding a knife these days. He never looks happy. He never looks safe.

Fuck, he’d just about kill to see him smile again.

Chase takes a deep breath and swallows down a burning at the back of his throat, reaching out to rub the back of JJ’s neck roughly.

“Look, bud,” he sighs. “I know how hard you’re trying to protect me, but I wish you’d look after yourself a little better. It’s just you and me now, you know? And that – that isn’t easy, but if we’re going to survive… we both need to survive, right, man?”

JJ doesn’t turn to him. The sunrise makes him pastel in blue and pink.

“I love you,” Chase adds. “I’m really glad you’re here, J. What would I do without you, huh?”

He smiles and gives his brother another affectionate clap on the shoulder, adding a playful tug on his ear, trying to get him to look at him.

And Jameson turns and he is weeping.

“You’d be much better off without me,” he signs, and then he breaks down completely, slumped against the dashboard with gasping sobs trembling their way out of his mouth.

“Fuck,” Chase can’t help but spit out, reaching out to leave a hand on his brother’s back as he slams the brakes hard and drags their exhausted little car onto a quiet gravel shoulder, where only fence posts and sparsely forested grasslands stare back at them.

Chase unbuckles and gets out of the car, moving to Jameson’s side and pulling open the door. After that, all he knows to do is reach out, gentle, and grab JJ’s hand, ferocious.

He hasn’t seen Jameson cry in weeks. He has been steel and defense, gritted teeth and deadened eyes, since what happened.

“Tell me what’s going on,” he says.

“What’s going on?” JJ demands, yanking his hand away. A magpie calls a reprimand to the trees, her black head shining with the golden light of the oncoming day. “Let’s stop pretending there’s any relief to be found in this, Chase. In escaping. In running. In fucking off to another country and wearing baseball caps low over our eyes and pretending the internet doesn’t exist. In driving all day and all night, in grieving from the front seat of a stolen car, in never seeing home again.”

“Fine,” snaps Chase, gripping his hand and leaning closer. “Fine, there’s nothing good about this. Does that make you feel better? There’s nothing good about this situation.

Except you.”

Jameson stills, sniffling sadly and wiping harsh at the salt on his cheeks.

“You’re all I got left, man,” Chase murmurs, putting his other hand on his shoulder. “You’re everything. And I’m tired of seeing you so… quiet. Listen, I’m in grief too. You’ve heard me crying often enough to know. But if we’re going to survive, we have to survive together. I need you healthy. Or as healthy as you can be. Capeesh?”

JJ looks up, his mouth trembling, and gives Chase the smallest nod.

“Tell me what’s wrong.”

Jameson is pale and exhausted, thin with bad eating and long nights of running, hollowed and hopeless and lovely, lovely as he has ever been, a blue-eyed boy with a softness in his face and power in the lines of his hands. Chase brushes a curl of hair from his brother’s eyes, his fingers drifting over the curves of his face.

“It’s my fault,” says JJ.

“Oh, buddy – ”

“No, it is, I mean it, it’s all my – it’s all my fault.”

“Don’t say that, Jays. It’s not true.”

“I was supposed to be watching Schneep.”

“You did everything you could.”

“Jackie and Marvin went to protect Jack, and I was supposed to watch Schneep, I was supposed to save Schneep, I was supposed to – ”

JJ collapses onto Chase’s shoulder, weeping so hard he can barely breathe. All Chase can do is hold him, hold him close and cry out, “You did everything you could. You did everything you could. It’s not your fault you were the last line of defense.”

And this is the truth, but it makes nothing better.

Jameson Jackson did his best. Fought his best. Loved his hardest.

It was only enough to save one.

And he’s afraid – afraid to the core of his being, afraid down to his trembling heart – that, soon enough, it will no longer be enough to save Chase either.

“I love you,” says Chase. “And you and I? We’re going to find some happiness again, someday, okay? Maybe not today. Maybe not tomorrow. But someday. You deserve that much.”

Jameson stares back at him, reaching out to clutch his hands. Slowly, wearily, he lets his watching eyes slip shut, and rests his head on Chase’s shoulder.

They sit by the side of the road for a long time. The cicadas are singing in the trees.

  


The stars watch over them.

Or maybe they’re just watching.

Chase can never tell anymore. Everything feels like a threat these days.

“On the road again,” he hums, bouncing his leg and trying to entertain himself by tapping his fingers against his knee. “Oh, I can’t wait to get on the road again!”

He pauses, glancing over at JJ.

“That’s not true,” he admits, and Jameson looks back at him warmly, giving his fine blue eyes a quick roll made visible by the ugly yellow overhead light they flickered on for comfort in the dark.

There’s no one else out here. They take back roads when they can.

“What state are we in?”

Jameson frowns, drumming his fingers against the steering wheel thoughtfully before offering Chase a guilty look of surrender.

“You don’t know?”

“Maybe P-E-N - ”

“Penis, my favorite state, perfect.”

Chase gets a punch in the arm for that one. Worth it.

There’s a little more fire in JJ tonight, he thinks. He hopes. Maybe it’s because they spent more than they should have on dinner to get little ice cream cones for dessert, or maybe there’s just been enough time passed that Jameson’s paranoia is settling down, but one way or another, he’s hoping to see some joy on his face soon. If he keeps cracking enough dumbass jokes, he can get him to smile, can’t he? Surely there’s some happiness coming their way at some point, considering that the universe has been well and truly fucking them over for the past four weeks. Surely.

Chase glances around for wood to knock on, but he can’t reach the trunks of the heavy forest zipping along past their window. The headlights illuminate a warning sign on the side of the road before them, neon yellow with the black form of a deer printed on its surface, and Chase jerks back as he accidentally meets the gaze of the enormous grey owl sitting atop it.

“These woods are creepy,” he complains.

“Sleep,” suggests JJ authoritatively, pushing Chase’s shoulder.

“Hey, you sleep,” Chase grumbles back, pushing his shoulder back. “Maybe we could - oh, shit! Is that a CD case?”

His enthusiasm makes Jamie flinch, but a second later he is watching with interest as his brother rifles hurriedly through the pages of the CD holder, laughing louder with each disc he lays eyes on.

“Al Green - Frank Sinatra - holy shit, both discs for the Order of the Phoenix audiobook. You want to listen to some fucking Harry Potter?”

“No.”

“Aw, come on.”

“Those were Marvin’s favorites!”

There’s a pause. Chase stares over at his brother. Jameson stares over at the road, pale with distress.

“Yeah,” says Chase eventually. “He was a real nerd for this shit.”

He gets punched in the shoulder again, but Jameson’s eyes are affectionate. Chase grins and adjusts in his seat, crossing his legs in front of him.

“You remember that time he set the kitchen on fire?” he asks.

Jameson blinks, his mouth twitching. “Which time?”

“Ha ha! The time I was cooking a whole goddamn turkey in the oven and he sent everything up in smoke? Schneep stepped into the house, took one look at all of us screaming and trying to put the fire out, and walked right back out.”

Jameson snorts, loosening his grip on the steering wheel. Yeah, he remembers. He remembers laughing.

“But that was also the day Jackie came home so badly hurt,” Jameson reminds, drawing his hands away from the wheel just for a second.

“Yeah, well, that one was his fault. He never could resist a fight with a guy twice his size. I don’t know if you ever heard this - it was before you were created - but he once got his skull busted open by some asshole with a whole mob of lackeys, woke up in the hospital after four days of being comatose, and went out that same time to get his revenge.”

“He did not!”

“Oh, he so did. I think that was the only time Schneep ever followed through on his threat to lock him in his room.”

Jameson’s mouth twitches. He glances over at Chase with an eyebrow raised and then looks back to the road, sighing a content sigh.

Warmth blooms in Chase’s chest like the sunflowers along the side of the road. Then the silence drags on for too long and he decides to take drastic action.

“I’m putting one of these CDs in.”

“Don’t put one of those CDs in!”

“I’m doing it, you can’t stop me, I’m - ” Chase yanks Sinatra’s top hits out of its case and moves for the CD player. Jameson intercepts, shoving his hand out of the way.

“Those all look terrible! I don’t want to listen to any of that!”

“Sinatra!” cries Chase, laughing almost too hard to fight back.

“No!”

“Yes!” With a final, determined gesture, Chase slams the CD into the player and turns the volume up.

Jameson shakes his head at him with faux irritation, his eyes shining warm in the ugly light of the car.

“Some day,” sings Sinatra, low and wavering, and Chase lets out a whoop of delight. “When I’m awfully low… when the world is cold… I will feel a glow… ”

“Just thinking of you!” Chase sings along at the top of his lungs. Jameson shakes his head, trying not to smile, the corners of his mouth edging upwards. “And the way you look tonight!”

“You’re so cheesy,” says JJ, glancing to the side as a deer leaps through the trees, startled by the headlights. “Such a dork.”

“Hey, you’re the dork, dapper man.”

“Yes, you’re lovely!” cries Sinatra, with passion. “With your smile so warm and your cheeks so soft! There is nothing for me but to love you.”

“And the way you look tonight!” Chase finishes, breaking down into giggles.

It’s one am in Eastern time and this abandoned back road is taking them towards whatever state it feels like. They’re in the middle of nowhere, hiding but together, tired but alive.

That’s all that matters.

A smile spreads like a sunrise across Jameson’s mouth. Chase hollers his delight, only making Jameson laugh harder, leaving them both shaking in their seats, overwhelmed and full of warmth, loving and united, brothers and- there is a man in the middle of the road -

“Jameson!” screams Chase, and his little brother’s hands grab the steering wheel and pull -

  


“Fuck,” whispers Chase, awakening.

Copper-taste sits in his mouth like poison and he coughs, pain racing through his chest and blood dripping down his lip. Confused, he lets out a soft whimper and tries to sit up, but his seatbelt, crushed tight against his chest, does not allow it.

He’s grateful for it, too. Without it, he’d be dead for sure.

There is an arm in front of him too.

His little brother’s arm, shattered.

“Jameson,” calls Chase, blinking warm blood from his eyes, trying to see in the darkness.

Jamie is a black silhouette beside him, unmoving.

“Jameson!” he cries again, struggling to breathe.

This can’t be happening. They can’t have survived this much only for a freak accident to take his last brother from him. Please, God, this can’t be happening.

He unclips his seatbelt and shifts in his seat, crumpling against the dashboard and splitting blood onto its grey plastic surface. Through the shadows, he makes out the figure of the ancient tree currenly mashing faces with their stolen car.

They swerved off the road, into the forest. They are miles from civilization. They have no phones. Phones are unsafe. Anti, after all, utilizes internet signals and electricity the same way cowboys utilized horses.

Chase reaches out to touch Jameson’s shoulder. Fumbling beside the steering wheel, his fingers find the light switch, yanking it up, and, to his enormous relief, one of the headlights resumes its duties, illuminating the creaking forest all around them. Something scurries away through the bushes.

Jameson is slicked in blood. He rests against the red glass-stained window of the driver’s seat, as still and as white as the bones of a deer.

No, this wasn’t an accident.

This was someone’s fault.

“Hey, asshole,” howls Chase, tumbling out of the side of the car. His fingers dig into earth and twig and worm in the damp floor of the forest. “You’ve hurt my little brother! Come down here and help us! Why the fuck were you standing in the middle of the road?”

He remembers vaguely the dark shadow of the man, a cold form dressed all in black, with a hood drawn over its head, but he cannot see it now, cannot even make his eyes focus on the road.

“With each word, your tenderness grows…”

Chase startles, staring back at the car. He realizes, at the intersection of confusion and abject terror, that the CD player has just turned itself back on again.

He is a stiffened stag on the side of the road, unable to move, unable to breathe.

“Jameson,” he whispers, and turns away from the figure on the road. He takes it all back. He does not want the man to come down here. He does not want his help.

He crawls to Jameson’s side, vomiting blood and his last meal as he drags himself towards his little brother and staggers to his feet, grabbing at the seatbelt that holds him in place.

“Tearing my fear apart,” sings Sinatra, growing louder. “And that laugh wrinkles your foolish heart… Lovely, never ever change…”

And then Chase sees the black-hooded figure of the man, standing close, beside the tree that connected with their car. His jeans are ripped and there, on his breast, a mockery – the letters “PMA” scrawled out in angular font.

“Jameson,” begs Chase, yanking desperately at the seatbelt, unable to get it loose. He scrambles to find a pulse in his neck instead, but his shaking fingers give him no hopeful reply.

“Keep that breathless charm! Won’t you please arrange it?”

The CD display glitches.

Chase screams aloud, biting at the seatbelt, choking on the outcry of his broken ribs, hunted down at last, found at last, discovered and destroyed, alone. Finally, he manages to yank loose the seatbelt, but it means nothing. Reaching out to drag him away, he sees that Jameson’s legs are crushed by the indent in the car, trapping him better than if he were chained.

Whimpering and gripping at his hair, Chase falls back. Anti is closer now, close enough to touch him, standing still by the engine of the car. His blue and brown eyes are like those of a cat’s in the darkness, and Jameson is the rabbit he has caught.

And Chase understands that he cannot save his little brother.

But he could save himself.

“Go on, Chase Brody,” whispers Anti. “Try to run.”

His voice does not glitch. His body does not spasm. This is his victory, and in it not a single flaw is visible or spoken aloud. He has the perfect corpse to contain him.

“Please,” whispers Chase, touching Jameson’s hand. “Please.”

“Don’t beg after you’ve put up a fight for the first time in your life,” purrs Anti. His brown eye brightens slowly to green, glowing through the darkness. His hands are stuffed in Jack’s hoodie pockets. “The two of you actually managed to evade me for quite some time. Don’t you want to get away, Chase?”

He intones the name with a deep sarcasm, grinning around the ironic sound of it.

“I’ll even let you run,” he promises. “I’ve started to enjoy this most dangerous game, hunting the two of you down across the country. You even slipped my vision once or twice. If you run now, I’ll give you a two-day headstart, how does that sound? You might even be able to escape me.”

Chase’s ribs are broken, but with adrenaline coursing through him, he thinks he could run, or at least stagger back to the highway and wait for help to come. He’s got two hundred and forty dollars worth of cash shoved into his pockets, enough to keep him eating for a few days. He could hot wire another car. Escape the hospital before they could bill him. He could live.

“No. No. Not without him.”

Lost and desperate, terrified and resigned, he gives up the idea of escape and does the only thing he can think of – he crawls into the seat beside Jameson, wraps his body around him, and tries to protect his body from Anti.

Jameson is motionless beneath his hands. His face is split into sections of blood and protruding bone. Chase looks down at him and begins to howl, despair exploding through the cheap dam of optimism that has kept him alive for the past four months. Jameson only bleeds in reply.

“If you’re going to kill us,” whispers Chase. “Then kill us.”

The stars are watching. Deer creep through the trees, wary and glorious, their eyes shining in the dying glow of the headlight. Here under the trees of the forest, Chase has found his ending.

He’s ready to see his brothers. Ready to see Jameson happy and the others unharmed.

He closes his eyes and pictures their smiles, warmer than sunlight, lovely and golden, filling the land of salvation like milk and honey.

They are beautiful and wonderful and joyous, and he sees them now before him.

“Cause I love you!” sings Sinatra, and Anti strides forward, pulling the hood back from Jack’s face. “Just the way you look tonight.”

**Author's Note:**

> Originally written on tumblr. You can find me at the same username. Hope you enjoy! Sorry it is a sad one. I don't really write plotless snippets, and for some reason sad endings always seem to wrap things up better for me. I'll try to have something happier soon. But still quite proud of this one.


End file.
